#just ask me how I navigated it cuz it was a solo mission!!

[tropiyas]

kind of hate how everything you do is implied to be with someone else, one of the first things someone asks after i mention any activity is usually "who did you go with?"

[smolbeandrabbles]

Video Games - Nolan Sorrento x Reader (Ready Player One)

GIF CREDIT: X

Author’s Note: Well this was one scene long until I listened to this song. So, you’re welcome!

I always come back to this end scene for Nolan, and in all honesty it’s one of my favourite things to think about, so thank you @primadonna-girl23​ for finally giving me a reason to write it! I hope you enjoy!  Thank you for your request! 💙💜

Video Games - Lana Del Rey

Disclaimer: RPO characters not mine / gifs not mine / lyrics not mine.  I tend to like writing Nolan like this, and I will live and die by it!

Premise: There’s nothing you love more than playing video games with Nolan. But hes good, and he doesn’t lose. All you vow is one day someones gonna beat him, even if you have to wait for another generation to do it for you...

Words: 2771

Warnings: Small swears / insulin warning

_______

Swinging in the backyard Pull up in your fast car whistling my name Open up a beer And you say get over here and play a video game I'm in his favorite sun dress Watching me get undressed take that body downtown I say you the bestest Lean in for a big kiss put his favorite perfume on Go play your video game

Singing in the old bars Living for the fame Kissing in the blue dark, playing pool and wild darts Video games He holds me in his big arms, drunk and I am seeing stars This is all I think of This is my idea of fun Playing video games

It's you, it's you, it's all for you Everything I do I tell you all the time Heaven is a place on earth where you Tell me all the things you want to do I heard that you like the bad girls honey, is that true? It's better than I ever even knew They say that the world was built for two Only worth living if somebody is loving you Baby now you do 

 ---

 This may well have been one of your favourite past times.  Sure, you were dating Nolan Sorrento, who at any point in time – as the CEO of IOI and with the millions he made – could whisk you down town in one of the many sports cars he owned to a bar, or a club, or restaurant, where all the stars hung out, or on some expensive getaway to anywhere in the world; heck, Nolan and his money could get you anything, and often did… But there was really nothing better than sitting in his living room trying to kick his ass at retro video games. You failed more times than you won, and sometimes you thought he let you win just because of the pout on your face, but you didn’t see how you could enjoy anything as much as this. With the sometimes God awful graphics, and the very most the consoles could really do was occasionally vibrate the controller (which made you shriek and him cackle the first time it happened) these games were a far cry from the OASIS – and yet you preferred them. These old restored gaming systems and the various disks and cartridges that came with them, along with movies from years gone by, were Nolan’s pride and joy. The 90s into early 2000s were his vary favourites; staples from his childhood. But he had right through until the latest editions – just before this type of gaming became nearly obsolete. You could play them in the OASIS, of course, but Nolan didn’t see the point when you could get the real experience by putting your mind to fixing things. Essentially his only past time before he’d become CEO – and now he didn’t have a lot of time for things like that, but he could escape to play them. Sometimes you just liked to watch him on single player go through something a little more strategic – but he’d let you pick out what his character looked like, or maybe who they would side with, or the conversational track that he’d go with. And you liked the times Nolan would go quiet for just a moment and then almost shudder, and say something like, “Oh my god the soundtrack!” which made you focus on it for the remainder of his playthrough.

But on occasion Nolan would put in a multiplayer game and throw you a controller; and you’d either get to help him, or try to beat him. And it was fun to lie back on the sofa between his legs, head on his chest – tongue stuck out in concentration and yell expletives every time he beat you. “You can do better than that!” He laughed again and you smacked his leg, “You’re infuriating!” He gave you nothing more than a teasing grin; “Oh, I’m trying very hard I assure you!” “OH! SHUT UP!” But you were good humoured about it, and Nolan still laughed when you resorted to cheating, attempting to block his view or distract him from time to time. Which he used to say would serve you right if you still lost; sometimes he’d pin you between or under his legs so you couldn’t move, and you thought he was doing a little too much Kegel. Sometimes Nolan would even beat you with one arm around your waist, holding you close to him as you balanced on his knees so he was playing one handed, just to prove he could – or he’d give you a ten second head start. You had to admit that he was good, but he was also an expert – Nolan knew these consoles inside out, and he’d grown up doing this. So, no surprises there either. Today this wasn’t the plan, you were supposed to be going out on a date – judging by the fact you were wearing a sundress, and he was in a nice shirt and pants. But on the drive out of town Nolan had started telling you about games he’d been reprogramming, and fixing up and some new ones he’d managed to get hold of. That information didn’t come with a price tag, but you could imagine the expense – and before long you found that more interesting and you were on your way back home. But this was a little more casual, and after getting bored of losing to him for the umpteenth time, Nolan let you play it for yourself. “Y-You sure!?” “Mhm…” He popped the cap on his beer, “I’ll help you out!” You smiled sweetly; “Don’t you want to play it first?” “No…” He gave a shrug taking a sip, “I played it enough as a kid – you don’t even know what this game is, time I taught you. It’s one of my very favourites…” And so he did help you navigate around – or point out little hidden pieces of game play or items you would have surely missed, occasionally he’d take your hands and the controller in his to assist with some of the harder stuff where you insisted you didn’t have enough fingers to work it all out at once – but Nolan watched that smile on your face grow every time he did so, and felt that maybe you were asking for his help on purpose. Eventually you sighed gently; “I love doing this with you…” “What? Hanging out on my couch playing retro games and skipping dates?” Nolan chuckled, taking another swig of beer – he was surprised there was any left considering your practice of taking it from him when you thought he wouldn’t notice. “Don’t say it like that…” you tipped your head back to catch the amusement on his face; “This is nice and relaxed… And we’re together, how is it not a date?” He tilted his head both ways; “I dunno, I guess I kinda like taking you out…” Nolan paused thoughtfully, “I’m not saying you’re wrong though, this is… I could get used to it.” “Get used to it?” You paused the game and rolled over to face him, “Careful what you wish for Nolan Sorrento!” But he still laughed; “That doesn’t sound like it bodes well for me. Ah, I think I could put up with you for a while.” “Thanks!” But you were laughing along, until you bit your lips together, “I…Think I could probably get used to this too.” He stared at you for a little while, almost in adoration, before he leant forward, touching his nose to yours before kissing you. You closed your eyes to him, content, before wrapping your arms around him and deepening the kiss. Sorrento eventually broke it, arms still around you – before chuckling nervously, a faint shade of pink dusting his cheeks; “Aha… Okay, before we get a little too used to this… I say we don’t waste that beautiful dress, and you let me take you out for dinner?” You giggled, stealing another kiss – “Okay! Dinner it is!”

 ***

That feeling never changed, not through dating moving from months to years, or moving in with him, or getting engaged… then married… and not even the stage you were at now. You were getting better; you could actually beat him at these games now – and Nolan was only ever impressed. He enjoyed it when you won as much as you did, because of how happy you were that you’d actually beat him – and the excitement on your face; the way you’d start screaming sentences when you were nearly there. Or how he’d manage to reign it back (even if you still won), and you’d scream “NO!” so loud he thought eventually someone might knock on the front door to see if you were okay. Luckily it’d never happened. Right now you were supposed to be helping him on a campaign, but you were much more interested in watching what he was doing and snacking. “Are you actually gonna help, or…? Cuz I can go back to single player if you’d rather.” “No.” You said through a mouthful of Chex, “I’ll help, just give me a second.” He chuckled, and you held up the bag to offer him one, which he thanked you for. Truth was at 7 months pregnant you’d rather sit here quietly, head in his lap and watch him. Whilst you were sitting eating and watching Nolan do all he could in the mission solo, you’d balanced the controller on your stomach and every so often, as your baby moved, the controller wiggled around on its precarious balance. But that only made you laugh. This position was at least comfortable for you; and usually you sat like this to watch movies too – where Nolan would cuddle you close and rest his hands over yours on your stomach; where his face became a lot more interesting than whatever you were watching. Nothing really compared to the way he lit up when your baby made a noticeable movement, and would pretend he wasn’t welling up – but you knew Nolan was, he couldn’t hide that from you – though he tried. However Sorrento accidently ran himself into the levels boss fight before you were ready; and to let you know something important was about to happen, the controller vibrated. “AH-!” You gasped which caused Nolan to jump, “Shit! Sorry!” But you laughed harder; “Not only was the vibration kinda startling…Ooh-! Okay! I don’t like you right now!” You took his hand and placed it over your stomach as you were given a third little kick; “Ooops!” He laughed, “And I’ve got you into a boss fight!” “Oops-!?” You folded your arms, “I should just let you die!! If this continues all night-!” Nolan cringed, “I’d really rather I didn’t die – besides if you get attacked that controller is only gonna vibrate more, you realise that-!?” Well, that made you pick it up pretty quick. “You are okay though, right?” “Yeah. I guess.” You grumbled, “If I can’t beat you, the baby will!” Nolan chuckled before scoffing; “Yeah, that I’d like to see-!” *** “THAT’S NOT FAIR!!” “Come on its two against one how is that not fair?” “THE COMPUTER IS HELPING YOU!” “Yeah and it’s pretty useless! You two should have this-!” “BUT IT ISN’T FAIIIIIIIIIIIR---!!” “What, you think I’m gonna let you win-!?” “REMATCH! PLAY FAIR THIS TIME!” “You’re on!” You were sorting a few things out in the upstairs bedrooms when you were met with yelling from the living room. You laughed to yourself; this was the kind of argument that had transferred from you and your husband, to your husband and your children. And Nolan was still the one winning. You walked out onto the landing; balcony overlooking the living room to watch them. Your two eldest boys were sitting on the floor, having clearly just lost another match, arms folded and sulking as they threw glares at your husband, sitting cross legged on the couch with your little girl – your youngest – curled up in his lap silently watching the whole thing. You couldn’t help but smile at the scene; just another weekend in the Sorrento household… “What are you guys doing!?” They all looked up at you “Dad’s cheating!” “What-!? I’m hardly even trying-!” That made both the boys gasp and look back to him; Nolan laughed like he’d just said something he shouldn’t have and grinned at you. You rolled your eyes, smiling, and made for the stairs, “Alright hold on I’m coming…” By the time you were downstairs they were seemingly settled again into another round, although even as you padded over you could see Nolan was probably going to get himself another win. There was a smile on his face that had only appeared since you’d had children, and his laugh this time was absentminded as they both ganged up on his character. For that he turned immediately to your daughter, and indicated to her which buttons to press to help him with the powered-up finishing move. Which had the boys yelling about cheating again and Nolan and her laughing at them. And for a minute you stood back, heart full watching them all. But especially Nolan – things had been hard at IOI for him lately, and it wasn’t exactly going as planned. But when he sat here with his children, it was like everything else was forgotten; he was laughing and happy, and you didn’t think you’d ever seen him this happy – not for a while – and he was relaxed. Today he was dad, not Sir, no matter how exasperatedly anyone was saying it. Your eldest spotted you in the corner and called you over; “Moooom! Can you beat him for us!?” They had heard of the famed times when you’d managed it, but it’d been a while. Nolan’s head swivelled and his eyes narrowed at you; “Oh! If you DARE--!!” You held your hands up; “Hey, I’m not taking sides-!” Nolan clapped as your boys groaned; “Ha! That’s my girl!” “Okay, Dad, one more round.” “Oh god, no, don’t you get sick of me beating you? I’m getting too old for this-!” Nolan chuckled, then he exited back to the games’ main menu to set up a multiplayer quest, handing the controller over to your daughter as you settled onto the sofa next to him. His voice lowered as he lifted her from his lap onto the floor; “Go on sweetheart – show ‘em how it’s done.” The controller was a little big in her hands but she beamed, “Play nice boys!” But he knew they would, as they lay on their fronts waiting for the game to load up again for them. She threw her arms around his neck and kissed his cheek gently; “I love you daddy!” “I love you too…” She ran off to join her brothers and he watched her go – that smile somehow bigger. You tsked “Such a daddy’s girl.” Nolan scoffed, but then agreed; “Yeah. Probably.” He held his arms out for you, watching the boys help their little sister with the controls for a moment with pride. You snuggled into him, head on his chest and he kissed your forehead – “I mean, of course I love you.” You giggled as he continued pressing kisses into your skin; “Oh that was never in doubt Nolan Sorrento!” You sat in silence for a moment – Nolan was watching the game play, and every so often would suggest strategy, as he’d used to do with you. You instead watched your kids help each other out on the floor, everyone content with life for now. Exactly how it should be, before you voiced your question, looking back to your husbands blue eyes; “Why don’t you let them win?” His smile was mysterious for a moment as he looked back to you; “Because one day they’ll beat me, and I’ll never win again!” then he grinned, “Besides, I like that they’re kinda in awe of me at the moment, and as long as I can keep that up and help them in the harder levels, I’d love to.” He placed his hand to his forehead to a moment; “…God, I’m dreading the day that don’t need me…” You shook your head, before placing a gentle kiss to his cheek; “Don’t say such silly things, they’ll always need you – you’re their father.” That smile was back, and Nolan pulled you closer to him for another kiss, before you heard the kids all cheering at beating another level and had to both laugh. Yes, for now all was right, and long may that continue.

---

Thank you for requesting! Thank you for reading!  😘💜

@3134045126​​ @happyskywhale​ @wltz-bby​ #MendoTagSquad

[thegoddamnowl]

Owl on Warframe (part 2): Owlframes, chance games and butts

Ok so after some more time into it, I managed to advance on Warframe. Since the first part of this lil review thingie I spat out, there have been a few important changes and updates with the game but never the less the experience from it was pretty much the same when I tested it so let's go.

Table of contents

Retake: Your body is ready... not.

Gameplay Extended: By the Power of VoidSkull

Graphics Extended: The Forma of Water

Music: DUN-DUN DUN DUN-DUN

Advice extended: I'm trying to be a guide and a friend here

Current impression: the Owl thoughts:RELOADED

Retake: Your body is ready... not.

Ok so there's not a narrative intro here since we are midway through at this point. So far so good, the game has presented challenges and with a bit of skill you can pass them no problem. You go through the Sol System tackling down nodes, gathering resources and parts, getting more and stronger mods as well as fiding your style to play whatever frames you chose to keep. However, there is a point where the difficulty ramps up too much, its not really a bad thing other than a slight oversight on how the enemy progresses in stats as they level up. But never the less, things become harder from Jupiter as enemies sport better stats that are on par or can surpass yours, can take hits and can deliver more of a punch if you are not careful, as well as their mission objectives becoming a little bit more complicated to accomplish as they are getting smarter in some places.

It is when you reach Saturn that you'll be asking yourself "HOW AM I SUPPOSSED TO SURVIVE THIS??"

Jupiter's jump of difficulty wasn't so bad since now you are basically commined to throw a bit more of effort into getting better stuff, which is really not much problem, but Saturn is unforgiving if you didn't do that. Guess how I learned this.

So, once I had to make up the resources I needed to become stronger (which took some time) I could finally progress through the star chart as I used to from the start. You know you can do it when you can take down that one boss in just a few minutes/seconds of initiating battle.

This will go on the recomendations as well but let me tell you this: UPGRADE YOUR MODS. If you remember, I told you mods are a substantial part of the game, but it wasn't until I hit Saturn that I was forced to upgrade them as I went because until I reached there I actually never had need to upgrade them in the first place: just getting basic unranked mods was enough to carry me all the way until Jupiter and part of Europa. The boss I'm talking about too is actually on Europa so you are most likely to not progress if you went in like I did.

In any case, if you go upgrading your mods you'll find out you can progress as normal. But this also makes you upgrade any other new good mods you find along the way. In any case, is not something you can't solve but sometimes arrogance cant take the best of you. It will take some time to level and unlock stuff if you didn't already.

But anyways, once you have upgraded mods, the game's difficulty curve settles in a bit more and you can take on the following planets, at least until you reach Pluto. Having the right warframe for the job is also of help since some of their abilities are life-savers on some situations.

Personally speaking, among all my frames, my favorite warframe to use is Mirage Prime (thank you @mikonopants​ for helping me getting her, I’m indebted to you forever), or as I affectionally call her: (cl)Owlframe

She’s a clown, an owl, and a complete sweetheart, and I love her and her pretty, soft, round butt so much. But really her kit is useful for many situations so yeah she’s my to-go frame as she adequates to my play style. Besides she’s just so fun to play with and shes also the reason i got to finally try warframe in the first place

I still suck tho

Gameplay Extended: By the Power of VoidSkull

Now, everything I said on the first was good things but Warframe is not free of its problems. I’m not going to talk about bugs or glitches since the game on PC is technically still a beta so yeah this is strictly about gameplay features/mechanics. Trust me, I’ve had my fair share of encountering those but this is not of concern here.

As I mentioned before, enemies escale on stats the further you progress, which isnt bad, but because of the way that boost works you'll be hitting a big wall by the time you face enemies on the levels from 21 and forth, so getting your mod collection to higher ranks becomes a priority as well as upgrading your arsenal with more powerful weapons that suit your style.

Also worth mentioning is the change in layouts depending of enemy levels: the layouts themselves are not hard to navigate, but the more advanced the enemies are, the more you are required to kind of memorize the tileset's paths and shit to accomplish your tasks more efficiently since they become increasingly complicated as you progress. I dont know how many missions of Grinner Spy I've played but now I know the layout like the back of my hand and know how to approach situations best depending on which layout did I get.

There' also the inherent problem of getting your mods in place: you need a resource called Endo to increase your mod rank but you also gonna need credits as well. The credits are not much of an issue, but the Endo can be since its given on scarse quantities (a few hundreds) when you are gonna need thousands of it. There's also an inherent issue with how the weapon modding system works: any rankless weapon will start with mod capacity equal to your player rank, but because these are unranked you won't get any more capacity until the weapon's level exceeds your rank level. You can imagine how exhausting that could get for a player Rank 8 and not being able to throw some good shit until the weapon reaches rank 9 (since it will gain one extra point from here on).

With that last point comes about the double-edge sword of farming Affinity (experience): There’s just not a reliable way to level up stuff fast to get up to speed but there is nodes and issions that can help you mitigate that problem to an extent. The issue comes that without a proper set up, grinding Affinity becomes a tedious task, which eventually will get mixed in with credit farming as you are gonna get stuff that becomes pricier.

There’s also some mission types that can get you exhasperated becuase you either get lost on how it works or plain simple you just dont know what to do or the mechanics are half-baked. Although I like the mode, Archwing nodes can suck my ass because

You don’t get any mods for AW from normal play, you get them on AW missions. The problem: the mods don’t drop any reliably, so you are gonna die and die and die trying to get mods to make it bearable

You don’t get any blueprints for anything AW, you have to research those in the Dojo or spend platinum. And even then, if you do get the blueprints its just too much resources put into it since the parts for any of the AW weapons you get them by leveling up Syndicates to rank 3 minimum

AW is hard to control. Or rather: it keeps moving forward in space, and it doesn’t move quite right underwater. Combined with all the above I can see why people gets frustated with this otherwise neat mode

Pursuit is just bullcrap if you don’t have a Fluctus and Amesha at least

There’s also some things that can help you further down the line, but I’m writting them as recommendations instead since its not really that very important but can still be good to know

There’s also the important part: RNG. You know what this entails.

Also bear in mind: since I play solo, most negative aspects of the game hit me pretty bad.

Graphics Extended: The Forma of Water

Ok I didn’t talk enough of this but really, for what is worth the game features very nice looking graphics, and can also run on toasters as well. Its just a pretty sight to look when the game runs so fluidly with all GFX turned on and shit. Granted, some effects can be annoying for some people but deactivating them solves the issue.

Anyways, the little details, decals, and all that sort of crap going on gets me giddy

Now, for the extreme toaster guys, there’s also an option to minimize the internal game resolution by minimum 50% (20% if you edit the configuration file directly). It looks pixelated as all fuck but runs very nice.

All in all, the only thing that doesn’t run as smoothly is the Earth Jungle tileset as it features a lot of intensive stuff but if you can manage to run it its actually pretty neat. There’s also Cetus on Earth but its mostly due to the connectivity aspect of the node. Hell, even the Plains of Eidolon run nicely, and look that its a huge memory eater (it takes me a solid 10 minutes to load into the plains but it runs nice)

Music: DUN-DUN DUN DUN-DUN

Well, there’s not much I can add here: the game’s soundtrack is pretty good and now having gone through the main events I’d say it hits me a lil more harder cuz [spoilers]

They also got their own version of the Terminator theme

Advice extended: I'm trying to be a guide and a friend here

UPGRADE YOUR MODS. If you do it as you go the difficulty curve won’t catch you off-guard like it did with me. You’ll thank me later when you get to enemies of levels 21 and beyond

Deactivate Reverb on the Audio settings of Warframe, it will drastically improve your performance.

Build weapons and see if you can change your old ones for newer ones. Let’s talk about stats: You know what they say, the more the merrier! some weapons are straight up upgrades from the stuff you might get first.

Along the last point: SEARCH WHICH WEAPONS CAN BE USED AS CRAFTING COMPONENTS. I still regret having sold my Lato, cuz I later found out I needed it for a Bolto. When I made my Kulstar, I didn’t repeat that mistake. Nowadays I can just simply buy out these but still when you don’t have enough resources yet, it can hit you

Along the last two points: Max out your weapons. More ranking for you means better weapons on the long run.

Don’t be afraid of putting potatos on your stuff, you are gonna do that anyways. Just make sure you do it on the things you are more comfortable with first

DONT FORMA YOUR STUFF YET. Better save it for the moment you can unlock Sorties. Because Forma resets your stuff’s rank and you are gonna need those capacity points to keep the stuff good, otherwise leveling it up again is a chore

Nightmare missions give out supplementary mods for your stuff. Rhino is still a very good friend, and so is Valkyr (except on energy drain mode, then you are screwed if you dont have a tankier frame or better weapons)

Use a Ducat/Platinum price list to see which Prime parts are worth selling for platinum or turning for Ducats. When Baro visits the relays and you have Ducats you’ll be a happy person cuz you can get nice shit from him that will help you by the endgame. If you get plat you will be  ahappy person becuase you can buy stuff you need or stuff for your leisure

Seek out for groups to do particular activities. Its always best when you are with a group that has people all loking for the same thing, like running fissures to get an especific Prime, maybe scan synthesis targets, and the like, so don’t be afraid of looking for them

Spy missions give you lots of Affinity at low levels: easy to do, quick to do, I usually run Suisei on Mercury when I want to level up stuff fast, but other (harder) mission nodes may work best too, just make sure you can reliably do them quick and without trouble. Personally speaking, Grineer spies are the easiest in comparison imho, but don’t do them on Grineer Sealab tilesets. Gabii on Ceres is a nice Survival Dark Sector to get both Affinity and Credits at the same time, I never run out of credits thanks to this node, though it feels like a chore after the 200th time or so

If you get a stealth frame, like Loki, or weapons able to stealth kill, make sure to take advantage of the stealth kills affinity boost: they can give you up to 500% affinity you earn and combined with high affinity gain missions its the best way to maximize your time

Try to have Warframes for specific tasks if you want to breeze it: I generally use Rhino for Hijack and Nightmare Missions (press 2, get a bit of damage, press 3, have a grand ol time), Limbo for weekly Ayatan treasure runs (and pretty much anything that requires me protecting stuff that isn’t Hijack, his entire skillset), Frost Prime for Defense and Assassination missions (press 3, sometimes 4), while Excalibur, Nyx, Mag, Valkyr and Mirage Prime are my all-rounders but excel at specific tasks: Excalibur and Nyx for the crowd control (press 4 and 3 respectively, though Excalibur is also a to-go when is not Mirage), Valkyr for survivals and nightmares in some parts (press 2, then 4, have yet to test on further nightmares), Mag for anything Corpus, and Mirage Prime for Interceptions and pretty much everything that isn’t Defense (press 1, then 3, have fun; not defense since she can do it but is just not as efficient as i’d like to for average tilesets)

Current impression: the Owl thoughts:RELOADED

I am actually on Pluto and pretty much completed the main storyline so far (i just need to take care of a few sidequests before the arrival of The Sacrifice), which is probably gonna be the last but its gonna take some time since situations out of my control have left me unable to play for some time. Still, my impressions haven’t changed: Warframe is a great game with neat ideas and stuff. Some work excellently, some not as good, but never the less is an outstanding free-to-play grame that I recommend at least trying, especially if you like games like Diablo 2.

The exciting finale of this review thing will be seen on Part 3: Reloaded with FEELS, Regor Roll and space jackoffs

And as my send-off for this part, have clowlframe butt

those are her mirror clones btw, praising her butt. the game doesnt lemme put ass in the writing :P